Hacking the Metaverse

Yes, saw this even in earlier forms of the metaverse.   Providing a simulated,  visual,  game-like reality makes it seem that your exposure to real loss will also be imaginary.  That is not the case.  

Hacking the Metaverse   By Louisiana State University, November 11, 2022

Said LSU's Abe Baggili, "Everyone needs to be aware that all technology has security risks. Once someone can access your device, they can potentially steal your money by accessing your banking and credit card accounts and wreak havoc on your life.”

Credit: Counterpoint Research

Louisiana State University (LSU)'s Abe Baggili and colleagues tested the security of immersive virtual reality (VR) and X-reality (XR) systems for weaknesses.

The researchers hacked a popular XR application used to watch movies with others in a virtual room, and found they could hijack a user's VR headset, view their screen, activate their microphone, and install a virus on their computer invisibly.

The virus infected other users who interacted with the compromised user, while the researchers also could enter the virtual room to eavesdrop.  They notified the app's developer, which accepted their recommendations.

Former LSU researcher Martin Vondrácek said the team open-sourced its hacking software, example exploits, and vulnerability signatures "to improve the state of the art of vulnerability detection and prevention in VR."

From Louisiana State University

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Phygital Shopping Realities?

 Extended shopping Realities: Phygital.   Broad term new to me. 

Is Retail Ready for a Phygital Future  by Carol Spieckerman in Retailwire

Through a special arrangement, presented here for discussion is a summary of a current article from the Spieckerman Retail blog and a synopsis of the key  takeaways from the latest Spieckerman Speaks Retail podcast.

Brands have focused their brand stories and customer relationships with determination to reach their digital destiny, yet traditional two-dimensional experiences haven’t evolved to meet the opportunity. Luckily, the landscape is set to change with a wave of innovation that will be unleashed in 2022 and beyond.

The CEO of ByondXR, Noam Levavi, is getting the ball rolling by creating immersive interactive 3D journeys in shoppable virtual environments.

Mr. Levavi defines XR, or extended reality, as an umbrella term for all immersive technology that merges both the physical and virtual worlds. He sees the metaverse as the next evolution of the internet that will be based on a 3D environment in contrast to the 2D feeds that still dominate e-commerce. Mr. Levavi claims that the current 2D feeds and layouts bring “no real experience” for consumers shopping online and that brick-and-mortar experiences are far more customized and engaging.

The company’s mission is to fuse the best properties of the physical world with the latest commerce and display technology to create compelling “phygital” experiences. ByondXR’s data confirms that its shoppable 3D virtual environments and gamification elements exponentially increase engagement. In Japan, for example, users play branded games hundreds of times over, even though rewards kick in after only one session.  ....' 

Augmented Reality Innovation

 Had not heard of this use of extended reality to promote innovation, consider the breadth of possibilities.

Researchers Develop First-of-Its-Kind Extended Reality Testbed to Speed Virtual, Augmented Reality Innovation    By University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign,   April 28, 2021  

A user experiencing extended reality. 

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign researchers have launched an open-source testbed for extended reality (XR) and, with key industry partners, a new consortium for the XR community.

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) researchers have launched an open source extended reality (XR) testbed to democratize XR systems research, development, and benchmarking.

XR is an umbrella term for virtual, augmented, and mixed reality, and UIUC's Sarita Adve cited an orders of magnitude gap between the performance, power, and usability of current and desirable XR systems.

The Illinois Extended Reality (ILLIXR) testbed is an end-to-end XR system that all types of XR scientists can use to research, develop, and benchmark concepts in the context of a complete XR system, and observe the effect on end-user experience.

Facebook's Rod Hooker said, "ILLIXR's open source modular architecture enables the XR research community to address challenging problems in the areas of optimizing algorithms, system performance/power optimizations, scheduler development, and quality-of-service degradation."

From University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign  

Extended Reality is for Employees for Now

Based on what we have seen form Microsoft and other players, VR and XR seem to be best for things the require a hands-free concept,  which accept he oddness of wearing some unusual and expensive head gear.   Do expect some exceptions,  but it will take a while for consumer transitions.  Also expect early work out of China, which is promoting wider use,  to see some advances.  Agree with Forester's look below.   See the full piece at the link.

Extended Reality (XR) For Employees, Not For Customers
By Samuel Stern,  in Forester

Just over a year ago, I was talking with my colleague Jenny Wise after she had returned from Mobile World Congress, 2018 in Barcelona. While we were talking about some of the virtual and augmented reality applications she had seen demonstrated at the event, it sparked a realization for us that the opportunity for altered realities, whether that be VR, AR, XR or mixed reality (MR) was much more immediate with employees than with customers.

That led to our latest report, The Extended Reality Opportunity Today: Your Employees, where Jenny and I share the three main employee use cases for XR:

Enhanced training. XR enables more employees to have more practice time in low-risk, virtual environments. Applications span everything from Walmart preparing its employees for the once-a-year but critical black Friday to  surgeons mastering surgical procedures. My favorite example? The FLAIM Trainer, which allows firefighters to simulate risky scnearios and get closer to the real things with little risk – and less expense too. This happens through a combination of VR elements to simulate a fire, along with real-world equipment like hoses and even haptic gloves (a huge feature for the interaction design) that simulated kick back from extreme water pressure.  .... "